


as friend and brother

by autumnstwilight (sewohayami)



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Backstory, Broken Bones, Childhood, Childhood Friends, Childhood Trauma, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, IgNoct, One Shot, Platonic Ignoct
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-11
Updated: 2019-01-11
Packaged: 2019-10-08 06:24:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17381324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sewohayami/pseuds/autumnstwilight
Summary: Ignis Scientia may be young, but he knows that the adults around him all have important roles to play, and wonders where his own place in the world is. Then he meets Prince Noctis.





	as friend and brother

As long as he could remember, Ignis had been aware that the people around him did very important things. Of course, there was the King, who he had only caught glimpses of, but had been told made the great wall that shimmered in the sky and covered all of Insomnia. It extended into the distance as far as he could see, when he sat in the back seat of his parents’ car and watched the city pass by. His father and uncle both worked for the King, his father leaving early each morning and returning late in the evenings, sometimes with a formidable stack of papers. He required peace and quiet to read them, but would often allow Ignis to sit in his lap and peruse the papers with him, occasionally asking him to “help” by reading a passage aloud. When Ignis stumbled on an unfamiliar word, his father would help him to sound it out, then ask what he thought it meant, and Ignis was getting better at guessing. And his mother was always there to make sure that he was safe and had all he needed, the evenings filled with the sound of her working in the kitchen, singing songs to herself and allowing him to sneak a spoonful to “taste-test”. By Ignis’ reckoning, she was the most important person of them all.

He regarded his surroundings with a fierce pride and protectiveness, had anyone spoken ill of Insomnia or his family in his presence, he would have chewed their leg off at knee-height. But as he grew older and began to understand more, a dissatisfaction began to gnaw at the back of his mind. He knew full well that his father needed no assistance reading the reports, and that the cooking turned out better when his mother stirred it herself rather than entrusting him with the task. He would never turn down an opportunity to help. But he wondered, with so many important things to be done, was it really okay for him to be so young, so small, so clumsy?

“You can do it better,” he said, dejectedly.

His father pushed the stack of reports aside, and fixed Ignis with his full attention.

“Of course I can. I’ve been doing this for much longer than you’ve been alive. But I can’t do it forever. Someday, you will have to take my place. It’s my job to prepare you for that. As my father did for me.”

“Oh.” Ignis thought about this for a moment, then turned back to the paper clasped in his hands. Someday he would have a place. “What’s ‘ally-ance’, then?”

“Alliance. We talked about allies before, didn’t we?”

“Oh yes. It’s… when countries are friends, right?”

“Right. Now the details of this particular alliance…”

* * *

 

It was not long after that when a change came. He was given a perfectly pressed set of dress trousers, shirt and waistcoat, and told to put them on carefully. Today he would meet the King, and the prince as well. His mother helped him with his necktie and straightened his collar, and told him to mind his manners. He didn’t need to be told.

The King was a kind man, one who managed not to talk down to Ignis despite the difference in physical height. He spoke calmly, wisely, with the sort of voice that men gladly follow.

“A king cannot lead by standing still. A king pushes forward always, accepting the consequences and never looking back.”

Ignis nodded solemnly. Whether it was the words themselves or the presence of the man who spoke them, he would never know, but he felt them weighing into his mind and leaving their mark. Behind the King stood a small boy, keeping his distance. He stared out into the empty space of the throne room, as if lost in a daydream.

“Should he stand still, I ask you to stand by him and lend him a hand- as his friend and as his brother.”

The boy stepped forward, encouraged by a gesture from his father. Ignis’ eyes met Prince Noctis’ for the first time. Remembering his manners, he offered his hand, and was a little surprised when Noctis immediately reached out to clasp it with both of his own, and gave a sudden, brilliant smile.

And everything made sense.

There were so many people, all around him, doing important things. The adults- they built the city, made the rules, kept it clean and bright and shiny and working. They spoke of serious things and read stacks of important papers. They made sure that everyone was safe. They were rulers, leaders, guardians, parents, teachers.

But none of them could be a  _ brother _ to Noctis.

“Please,” said the King, “Take care of my son.”

He answered with a smile of his own.

“Pleased to make your acquaintance, Prince Noctis. My name is Ignis.”

“Now boys,” said the King warmly, “Why don’t you run along and play?”

* * *

 

His new charge turned out to be rather a handful.

It wasn’t Noctis’ fault, he knew that. Noctis was still so small. It wouldn’t do to get mad at him when he spilled ink across a desk and then left inky hand-prints clinging all over Ignis’ shirt. Nor when he tried to show Noctis how to build a castle with connectable blocks, only for the young prince to become bored and tear it to pieces halfway through. Nor when his glasses were plucked from his face and then dropped into the courtyard fountain, and he got soaked through trying to retrieve them.

Of course, he had told Noctis  _ not _ to do these things, before, during and after. But what authority did a first grader really have over a prince who was barely more than a toddler? None, it turned out. All he could do was run after the younger boy and try to make sure that at least, he didn’t get hurt.

_ Take care of my son. _

He’d made a promise. A promise to a King and a Prince, no less. There was no way that he would ever betray either of them, no matter how many times his hair was pulled or his toes were stepped on, no matter how many of the favorite books that he tried to share were scrawled on with crayons, no matter how many times he felt tears of frustration burning at the corners of his eyes. He wouldn’t cry, and he would never give up.

It was the afternoon, and Noctis had tired himself out and was napping on a sofa. Ignis sat beside him reading a book, a collection of tales and literary excerpts for the young, now rather battered at the edges and with some pages hastily repaired with cellotape. He had read one of the tales out loud, until Noctis fell asleep halfway through, and he continued through the book by himself. 

_ The little prince went away, to look again at the roses. _

_"You are not at all like my rose… She is more important than all the hundreds of you other roses: because it is she that I have watered; because it is she that I have put under the glass globe; because it is she that I have sheltered behind the screen… because it is she that I have listened to, when she grumbled, or boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing. Because she is_ my _rose.”_

The words blurred on the page as he began to nod. 

* * *

 

He awoke with a start to find the sun low in the sky, and Noctis gone from his side. The room was quiet, and that, above all things, was cause for concern.

The wooden floor of the landing was lit amber, a fiery glow extending from window to wall. He hurried out of the room and across the open space, finding Noctis playing with some action figures at the top of the grand staircase, deeply absorbed in some conflict between the medieval knight and the robotic soldier he was mashing together. He marched himself over to the young prince and seized him by the wrist.

“Come back here, Noct. It’s not safe.”

Noctis stared at him for a moment, then shoved the knight into Ignis’ face, smushing his glasses into his eyelids.

“Hah! I am the Mystic, chosen by the Gods! I obey no man!”

“This is no time for horseplay!” He tugged at the boy, who flopped onto his backside and made himself a deadweight in protest. “You know you shouldn’t fool around near the stairs.” He snatched the knight from Noctis, hoping that it would entice him to follow, but instead the prince gave a squeal of anger and launched himself at Ignis. Ignis sidestepped, using his greater height to hold the figure out of Noctis’ reach, but his evasive maneuver had put himself between Noctis and the top of the staircase, and when Noctis leapt at him again, his heels found empty air and his stomach lurched as they both began to fall.

His reactions were all instinct. He wrapped one arm around Noctis, pulling him on top of his chest, and reached the other one out to grab the railing. But instead his arm slipped between two of the cast iron ribs that lined the staircase. They landed, Noctis heavy on top of him, and Ignis screeched as his trapped arm was wrenched by the weight and momentum of both of them. There was a horrible snap.

The ensuing silence lasted for the briefest of moments before both boys began howling simultaneously. Noctis’ eyes were wide with the terror of falling, while the pain hit Ignis all at once in a wave that dragged him under. Worse still was the panic, his arm was bent in a way that was terribly wrong, his own body had been broken, and he didn’t know how to fix this, didn’t know what to do, and it hurt, it hurt, it hurt. He was dimly aware that Noctis was sobbing as well, and part of his brain was telling him that he had to fix that too, that he had  _ promised, _ but his own pain and fear were already far beyond his ability for composure.

It didn’t take long for the commotion to attract adults, and suddenly Noctis was being lifted off him, dragged away while still clinging to Ignis’ shirt, wailing, “I didn’t mean it! I didn’t mean it! I didn’t mean it!” over all attempts to calm him down. Another pair of arms scooped up Ignis, and as gentle as they were, he screamed again when the broken limb was moved.

The rest of the afternoon was a blur of doctors and x-rays and prodding and questions. He was finally allowed to rest in a bed in the infirmary, and sat there dimly, under the effect of whatever painkillers they had given him, observing the strange weight of the plaster cast on his arm. The sound of the door opening awakened him, and he was surprised to find that he had drifted off long enough for night to fall entirely, depriving him of all sense of time. Slow, deliberate footsteps approached, and he looked up to see the King standing over his bed.

“Y-Your Majesty.” He tried to figure out how to bow while reclining in a bed, and ended up putting chin to chest in an over-enthusiastic nod.

“How are you feeling, Ignis?”

“I’m fine. I mean- there’s no need for concern. I mean-” He tried desperately to have his thoughts catch up with what his mouth was saying. “I must apologize for the trouble that I’ve caused. I should have-”

The King held up a hand, and he fell silent. Dread began to curl inside his chest. Noctis had fallen too, Noctis had been crying, Ignis hadn’t been able to take care of him. If the prince had been hurt-

“I assure you, there’s no need to apologize. Unfortunately, Noctis was not able to provide me with an exact sequence of events. However, it seems more likely that he inadvertently pushed you than the opposite.”

“He didn’t- He’s not in trouble, is he?”

The King sighed, “I have told him that he is not to wander off on his own, and that he must be cautious around staircases. But I think the fright that he got today is punishment enough.”

“Oh.” Ignis looked down again at the cast resting on the bed sheets. “Will my arm get better?”

“Of course it will. I’ve been told that the expected healing time is around six weeks.” The King gave a wry smile. “I am told many things, you know. That I must focus all my power on maintaining the wall. That, if I am to use my magic to heal, I should prioritize the military.”

He took Ignis’ hand, and a jolt of electric warmth surged through Ignis’ arm, settling deep into the bones.

“But don’t believe everything that you are told. There, that should ease the pain and shorten the recovery time somewhat. Consider it my apology.”

Ignis looked back at the King in confusion, until he became uncomfortably aware that it was rude to not say anything.

“Thank you? Erm, your Majesty.”

The King laughed, and then took a step back. “Speaking of apologies, there is another one owed.” He turned to the door. “Come in, Noctis.”

The prince shuffled hesitantly through the doorway, letting it close behind him with a soft thump. He made his way to the side of the bed and inspected Ignis’ arm and the cast with a doleful expression.

“Do you have something to say?”

Noctis blurted out as though he were about to sob, “‘m sorry, Iggy.”

“It’s alright, Noct,” said Ignis, and as he looked down at his cast again, he did feel, for the first time since the incident on the stairs, that everything would be alright. No one was in trouble, Noctis wasn’t hurt, the King wasn’t angry, and his arm wasn’t going to fall off. That reduced the situation to one that seemed, if less than ideal, at least manageable. At least until…

“Noct, is that a marker pen?”

“Yup! Dad said I should sign your cast for you! Here, lemme-”

“Watch out! You’re getting ink on the sheets!”

Ignis sighed and moved his arm closer to the edge of the bed. With an expression of grim concentration, Noctis scrawled “N O C T” in large, spidery letters across the cast on his forearm, then stopped to beam up at Ignis. Ignis found himself smiling back. Then, a larger hand reached down to take the marker, and moments later, Ignis was looking proudly at the words “Regis Lucis Caelum” in an elegant script, vivid in black against the white cast.

“Come now, Noctis. Let’s let him rest.”

The door closed gently once again.

* * *

 

He returned the following day to find Noctis waiting for him as usual, but his eyes immediately strayed to the white pressure bandage wrapped around his wrist. Ignis gawked in surprise, Noct hadn’t seemed injured at all during his visit the previous night. Had he really been so unobservant?

“Noct, are you hurt?”

The caretaker in the corner of the room laughed. “Not at all. But he begged us until we found that and put it on him.” Then, in response to Ignis’ befuddled expression, “He wants to be just like you.”

Noctis grinned at Ignis, “Iggy, you gotta sign it for me. I signed yours!”

“Alright, Noct,” he said, kneeling in front of the prince and taking his hand. “Let me find a pen.”

He took a marker and tried his best to write smoothly with his one functioning hand as Noctis squirmed. The ink bled into the cloth and it came out a little wonky, but when he was done Noctis held his bandaged arm up with pride.

“Look,” he announced to the room, “We’re the same. Now we’re real brothers!”

Ignis decided not to question Noctis’ conceptions of how exactly one became brothers with someone else. Instead, he shifted so that the two of them were standing side-by-side, hand-in-hand, his uninjured hand clinging to Noct’s bandaged one. Noct’s fingers were warm and a little sticky as they curled around his own, the fabric of his bandage rough between their palms. Their arms and shoulders were pressed against each other, and once again Ignis was struck by the rightness of being here, of having his place in the world defined.

_ Because you are my friend. Because you are my brother. Because you are the one whose side I promised to stand by. _

“What would you like to do today, Noct?” he asked, and waited for his prince to lead him.

**Author's Note:**

> I find Ignis' and Noctis' relationship very interesting, and wanted to do my own take on their backstory, and Ignis' childhood and character development. I've seen other fic writers make Ignis an extraordinarily precocious or genius child, and didn't want to go that route (though he's still pretty bright and perceptive for a six year old). Other fics I've seen give him an abusive past, which was also not my aim. Though it might seem that the adults are a bit absent/neglectful in this fic (and they probably could have kept a closer eye on the kiddos), part of it is that Ignis is determined to handle Important Things by himself, and thus doesn't think of looking around for a grown-up until things are really out of hand.
> 
> I let the idea sit for a while, and it kind of crystallized around a half-remembered bit of The Little Prince (Le Petit Prince). The prince, who lives on a tiny planet with only one rose, whom he loves dearly, is shocked to find that Earth has many, many identical roses, but eventually decides that _his_ rose is still special because he loves her. And I think Ignis' love for Noctis is something like that- Noctis is special and to be cared for precisely because he's the one that Ignis has taken care of all this time. (Of course, it helps that Noctis also has many good traits of his own.)
> 
> Originally, the book Ignis was reading had a bit of a fairytale (the variation of Rapunzel where the prince gets blinded) but eventually I decided to put the actual Little Prince quote in there to tie the fic together. Credit/apologies to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.


End file.
